


Torn Lab Coats

by CrazyCatMeow



Series: MC YouTube and HermitCraft one shots/ short stories [22]
Category: Hermitcraft
Genre: Doc backstory, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Little bit of angst, Mild Blood, NHO Secret Santa, how he became a creeper
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2020-12-26
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:09:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,878
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28340682
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrazyCatMeow/pseuds/CrazyCatMeow
Summary: Doc is working his normal job, he’s an engineer working with a biomedical team. He’s called away to talk with someone and the next time anyone sees him he’s been changed.
Relationships: everything is platonic - Relationship, n/a
Series: MC YouTube and HermitCraft one shots/ short stories [22]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2117622
Comments: 4
Kudos: 49





	Torn Lab Coats

**Author's Note:**

  * For [00FFFF](https://archiveofourown.org/users/00FFFF/gifts).



> Merry Christmas 00FFF
> 
> This Secret Santa thing was a lot of fun!

Doc grins as he finishes attaching some wires to a project. He’s been in his lab for nearly fourteen hours but he keeps working. He looks back at the metal structure he’s been working on and grins. He and his team have been developing cybernetic prosthetics. 

The progress has been slow but it’s recently hit a major breakthrough and they were almost ready to start the refining process. Yawning Doc runs his hand through his hair. It’s not often that he works this late. Normally the only other person at the labs at this time is the receptionist.

Downstairs a neatly dressed woman taps a stack of paper into a pile. Slipping it into a folder she files it away.

As she turns back to the computers the glass doors slide open.

“I’m sorry but we are closed for the day. If you go to our website on your communicator you could make an appointment for tomorrow morning,” She smiles as the four men walk in.

The leader of the group smiles, “Oh, sorry about that. We haven’t been to the mega-hub in years and our friend Dr. M works here.”

The receptionist smiles, “Oh, I’ll call him down for you. If you could wait outside for me, we are closed and well, company policies.”

“We understand,” He smiles, he motions for the others to follow him, “Thank you for your help.”

Nodding the receptionist turns to the intercom system, “Dr. M, there are some people here to talk to you.”

A few minutes later the elevator dings a man wearing an odd mix of crocs, jeans, a t-shirt, and a lab coat walks out. He slings his bag over his shoulder, “Thanks for letting me know, I’ll head home after this.”

“Mmhm, Good night.”

“Night, tell Mango I made a copy of the code for the arm?” Doc waves as he steps outside. Once he steps out the doors a hand grabs his wrist.

“I’ve got an offer for you.”

Doc yanks his arm free, “You could start with who you are.”

“Oh, of course, I’m JasperX17.”

“And what’s the offer?” Doc asks.

“Simple, you have quite the background in genetics, we want you to help us do this,” He hands Doc a few pictures.

Doc frowns, “You’re disgusting, I will never help you.”

“Oh, but you see, you don’t have a choice,” He clicks his fingers, and Doc is knocked out, picked up, and carried off to a nearby warp pad. 

The next morning watchers are at the lab where Doc is employed.

“No trace of them, they must’ve world hopped,” One of the watcher's nods.

A gasp is heard from one of the watchers, “I think he tried to recruit someone, look,” Handing the paper over to the first watcher they all frown. It’s a diagram showing a human being infused with mob DNA. The watchers frown as they head inside to ask some questions.

Doc hazelly comes to, he’s been locked in a small room. Looking over to the door he spots Jasper.

“You will stay here until you help us,” Jasper sneers from the hallway.

“Fine, I would rather die than help you.”

Jasper walks down the hall leaving Doc to his thoughts. 

Days pass with the same answer each time, then weeks, and then months. Jasper is getting more and more annoyed. One day he pulls Doc out of the cell and shoves him into a lab. Pinning him to the table he pulls out a needle and jams it into Doc’s arm. 

A few minutes later Doc is thrown back into his cell. Days later he’s taken out for experimentation. As it turns out the creeper DNA they infused him with did not give him regenerative properties. 

By this point, it’s been almost six months that he’s been trapped here, and Doc has given up hope that anything’s going to improve. 

One day he wakes up to alarms blaring, he hisses. A deep guttural sound that hurt his throat. The door is taken off its hinges.

Three admin-level watchers are standing in front of him. One gently takes Doc by his remaining arm and brings him to a hospital in the mega-hub. 

“What’s your name?” The watcher asks as he helps him walk.

“DocM77,” Doc answers as he shrinks away from the loud noises.

The watcher nods, “Do you have any family we can call?”

“No,” Doc says softly.

By this point, they’ve reached the hospital and it’s all a blur from there. 

“Doc, we are going to call some people to measure for cybernetics, is that alright with you?” One of the Doctors asks.

“Yeah that’s fine,” Doc murmurs in reply. He hasn’t been treated like an actual person in such a long time that it’s a bit overwhelming, people asking him if he’s fine with things and talking to him.

It's nice, he decides. The door swings open softly and a sharp gasp is heard as something falls to the ground, “Doc?”

Doc snaps his head over, “Mango, is that you?”

The squirrel hybrid walks over and carefully takes a look at Doc’s missing eye, “Yeah, it’s me, we thought you… anyways, uh Methodzz is coming up here any moment.”

“Awesome,” Doc grins, “From the fact, you're here, did you finish the prosthetics?”

“We did,” Ilmango grins, “The code you made worked really well and it let us finish up in a few weeks.”

Frowning softly Doc lets Mango take a few measurements and inspect his arm and eye.

“If you don’t mind me asking, what happened?” Ilmango asks, voice laced with concern.

“I was taken by a lab and, uh, they were trying to recreate the hybrid experiments. They were trying to activate the creeper DNA they gave me but I don’t have the regenerative properties that creepers do,” As Doc explains he hunched in on himself.

Ilmango frowns, “That’s horrible.”

Doc nods, a moment later a quiet knock comes from the door. Methodzz walks in, the torch inside his head flickers for a moment when the slime spots Doc.

As Mango carefully catches him up on what he’s done so far, the green slime frowns, “Doc, you look pretty normal, it sounds like what happened with the first attempt at mob fusion, it doesn’t show up until much later.”

Frowning Doc glares at the door, “This sucks.”

Mango nods, “The watchers are talking about sending you to a private no questions asked the server.”

“That sounds nice,” Doc mumbles.

Methodzz interjects softly, “We will of course reinstate your position if you want to come back.”

“Thanks for the offer, I might take you up on that one day. Oh, that reminds me, did you two get the survival test server?”

“We did, and people are actually interested in seeing what we can do.”

Doc laughs, “That’s awesome.”

The days following feel like a blur. His cybernetic are attached with no problems most of his friends stop by. One of them even smuggled his cat in to see him. 

Everything’s going just fine, he’s been allowed to move back into his apartment. When he asked the watchers about why he can’t stay on the mega-hub the answer he gets isn’t overly satisfactory, “It’s not safe for the transformation to take place in this world.”

Later when he’s ranting about it Mango gives him a solid answer, “They’re right about it not being safe, the transformation gives new instincts, in this big of a city who knows what will happen.”

“How long?”

“What?”

“How long will the transformation take?”

“A few months, but you will have to get used to people again,” Mango gently explains.

“I’ll see you soon,” Doc promises.

“I’ll see you… I hope.”

As Doc steps through the portal he feels like something has been taken, his pack. Shaking his head as he steps out of the portal he clears his thoughts, the heck is a pack?

“You must be Doc, hi, I’m Beef,” The tall, slightly blood-stained man grins.

“Hello,” Doc greets curtly.

“I’m Bdubs,” A slightly shorter man grins, if you value your life don’t call him short, ever.

Doc nods.

“I’m Etho,” The White-haired ninja grins behind his mask.

“Wait, like EthosLab Etho?” Doc asks, suddenly interested.

Etho laughs, “Yeah, that was me, Redstone.”

Doc grins as the others all laugh and start heading off spawn. After a few days, everyone has starter houses made and are ready to begin building their actual bases.

After the first few days, Doc has withdrawn and doesn’t intact with the others as much. The ‘transformation’ has apparently begun. Peppering his voice with Hisses, growls, and one horrifying time a purr.

The others do know about what’s happening, Doc may be very private but he knows when to tell other people certain things. This time he chose to explain what had happened just in case something goes wrong.

As the days turn into weeks and then into months, Doc has made a pretty impressive laboratory. He makes complicated Redstone designs then sends them around to the farming worlds.

It’s a nice quiet lifestyle, the only Creeper instincts he’s gotten so far is noises and an appreciation for cocoa beans.

One morning Doc wakes up and bustles around getting ready as normal. The sky is overcast and threatening to rain so instead of working on the exterior of a building he starts working on parts of an interior. As the day progresses Doc falters it’s like he doesn’t have any energy. He almost feels wilted...

Blinking rapidly Doc pulls his lab coat around himself and decides to face the storm, his closest neighbor is Bdubs. 

As he stumbles into the pretty house Bdubs looks at him for a moment before dragging him over to the couch.

“What happened?”

“I don’t know, I’ve been working inside all day, then about an hour ago I started feeling really sick, and tired.”

Bdubs hums to himself, “Ok, ok, uh, have you gone outside today?”

“No,” Doc hesitantly answers.

“Maybe you photosynthesis?” 

Doc hums softly, “Maybe, creepers are plants.”

“Well, maybe the transformation has started to pick up?”

“It might have.”

As it turns out the transformation had started to affect him physically. Peat moss has started growing on his ankles. His mouth has been hurting which makes Etho suspect fangs.

Doc isn’t too thrilled when the fangs grow in, sharpening his teeth to razor-sharp points. They make it harder to talk and they cut his lips a lot. His fingernails grow and form into retractable claws.

After a few weeks of getting used to what’s happened so far, Doc and Beef set out to go find some pigs. They had decided to make a pig farm and for that you need pigs. 

Beef and Doc carefully crouch behind a hill, “Ok, you go over there and scare the pigs this way.”

Nodding Doc slowly loops around and creeps up behind the pigs. Something in his mind nags at him to do something. Not able to pin what Doc continues. 

It’s not until he’s right next to the pig that he realizes what his instincts want him to do. Hissing he lunges at the pig, the other pigs rush towards Beef. The moss on his legs bristles as Doc claws at the pig.

After a few minutes Beef has all the pigs roped, looking up he spots Doc on the ground hissing angrily, “Oh, that’s not good.”

Running over to the Creeper, Beef pulls him away from the terrified pig.

Looking up at Beef, Doc blinks, “That was really weird. I don’t know what happened.”

Beef frowns, “Your ears.”

“What happened to my ears?” Doc looks terrified.

“They’re a little bit, smaller, and uh, it looks like they're a little greenish.”

“Great,” Doc rolls his eyes.

“We should get back to the others,” Beef motions as he starts bringing the pigs over. 

Doc nods and they start walking back, he stays a good distance away from the pigs. Not wanting a repeat of what had happened earlier.

By the time they get back Doc’s ears have mostly disappeared. Flattening into lizard-like holes on the sides of his head.

Beef puts the pigs in a pen before running off to tell the others what had happened, by this point Doc is a bit overwhelmed. He collapses into his bed and curls around himself, passing out instantly.

The next morning he awakes to a masked face blinking down at him, “Hey, Doc. Stay laying down for now.”

“Huh, why?”

“Well, Uh, you’ve got a lot more vines and moss overnight, I don’t think it’ll be a good idea to run around quite yet.”

Doc frowns a bit before cautiously raising a hand up to his metallic eye, “That’s weird.”

“What is it?”

“I’m getting some sort of overlay with my vision. Like my eyes aren’t matching…”

“Ooh snap, well, I think the creeper has reached up to your face.”

Hissing under his breath Doc grabs his Communicator, as he inspects his face he frowns. His remaining eye has darkened considerably.

“I think we should wait for a little to see if anything gets worse with my eye then ask if someone could come here and do something.”

Etho nods, “That sounds good, quick question, what can you see?”

“Uh, is like about half of my vision is desaturated, and I think I can sorta see heat? Like the colors around you are more warm?”

“Huh, interesting.”

A few days later nothing else has happened so they invite Ilmango onto the server. The moment he steps onto the server something odd happens. Doc perks up, he’s acting a lot happier than he has in a long time.

“Hey Mango,” Doc grins, he's unexpectedly ecstatic that his pack is back. It’s still odd that he’s calling one of his best friends pack, but it’s a creeper thing so he brushes it off.

“Hi Doc, so what’s up with your eyes?”

As he explains Mango looks at his eyes, his remaining eye is pitch black by this point. 

“Ok, so I can make it so your mechanical eye have more of a sway over your remaining eye, and I’ll probably have to give it a slight thermo overlay.”

“That’s fine.”

Mango nods as he links his communicator to Doc’s eye and implements the changes, “Alright, your vision should match up now.”

“Thank you, so much,” Doc grins.

Mango smiles, “So, show me what you’ve made over here.”

When he leaves a few days later Doc’s plants wilt softly. He feels like he lost something for a few days until he is able to snap out of it.

As he adjusts to his vision being some sort of normal his transformation starts to speed up. The moss fully covering his body. 

He’s gained a few new instincts and creeper like traits. having something covering his chest would feel wrong and oddly restricting. Almost like he was trapped. So he stopped wearing shirts. Thankfully his lab coat was fine so he keeps wearing it. Shoes had started bugging him as well, but that had a slightly simpler fix, crocs. Which don’t bother his feet. 

At one point he had to do a double-take when he had run up a flight of stairs on all fours. Bdubs was there and had snorted slightly at Doc’s face when he realized.

Currently, Doc is sitting in the grass near Bdubs base. It’s a sunny day and he just can’t bring himself to move out of the warmth. It almost feels like he's getting more energy from the sun. Hissing softly as he realizes, that’s probably exactly what’s happening. 

Shrugging it off he yawns, only to freeze when his mouth opens a bit too wide. Pulling a book on creepers out Doc frowns softly. Creepers can unhinge their jaws much like a snake and tend to swallow food whole.

Shuttering slightly Doc sets the book down. Looking up at the sky he shakes his head, he had come to terms with what had happened a few months ago and is just going with whatever’s happening to him at this point. Some things about creepers are just really weird. 

Like their irrational fear of cats. Which hopefully doesn’t transfer over to Doc, as he has one of the cutest most cuddly cats anyone has ever met. Even if it does he’ll find a way around it.

Months pass and one morning Doc receives a letter. It’s from one of the more secretive and drawn away servers, Hermitcraft. After a few weeks of thinking Doc accepts the invitation. 

When he meets the hermits they welcome him and they respect boundaries. It’s an interesting lifestyle to get used to especially when adding being a creeper to the mix.

A few years and ‘seasons’ pass before the start of a new world suddenly fills him with excitement, Beef, Bdubs, and Etho join him as a hermit. They have their fair share of adventures, defeating an evil jungle and all.

Doc has come to an understanding at last, and if every few weeks he heads to the mega-hub to spend time with his other friends the hermits don’t care. In the end, they just want him to be happy and to find peace with himself, and he has.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you all for reading.


End file.
